It’s like Schrodinger’s GlowForge, in this quantum state it is both delivered on time and delayed, don’t nobody check in on my Pro because you might shift its quantum state to “late” … 
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I was thinking of this anecdote:
[Feynman] received a pocket watch from his father. He wore it proudly, and his friends began to needle him; they asked the time at every opportunity, until he began responding, with a glance at the watch: “Well, four hours and twenty minutes ago it was twelve before noon,” or “In three hours and forty-nine minutes it will be two seventeen.” Few caught on. He was doing no arithmetic at all. Rather, he had designed a simple parlor trick in the spirit of gauge theories to come. Each morning he would turn his watch to a fixed offset from the true time—three hours and forty-nine minutes fast one day; the next day four hours and twenty minutes slow. He had only to remember one number and read the other directly from the watch.
So, “in 12 days there will be 6 weeks left before the end of October” seems very much in the spirit of this way of thinking.
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I think there’s a possibility that they’ll “ship” (in GF terms) all the US orders of Basics on time. Deliver them? No way. But send the emails? Maybe.
It’s looking unlikely to me that Pros will catch up with Basics.
And I have serious doubts as to whether they will even begin shipping internationally by then.
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@dan promised that International orders (Including Malta) would be shipped by the end of October!
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That doesn’t sound like Dan. Planning to deliver, working to deliver maybe. Promising? Never.
“understand and will miss you here! We’ll keep working to get you your Pro just as soon as possible. I hope you’ll be the first Maltese Glowforge owner soon.”
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Well, I took it as a promise!
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With the quoted concerns over production & delivery malfunctions i would be surprised if they ship internationally purely because they cannot afford for anything to go wrong at the levels they seem to have modeled.
It might not be a matter of production any more, they might be able to hit their targets… but their biggest hurdle could be production/delivery reliability
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There are some that seem to be demanding international shipments now. Given the frequent damaged deliveries it’s pretty easy to see why that might be one reason all shipments have been domestic so far. Wonder if anyone would agree to paying the two-way return shipping if the unit arrives non-functional? Probably not. Of course that in no way excuses the ever fluid schedule.
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Unfortunately this is always the case when a new product comes close to delivery date.
There are some of us who have been lurking/active on the forums for years - we have seen the ups and downs and know as much about the delays as anyone outside of Glowforge HQ can.
On the other hand there are others who are suddenly popping up out of the blue who have not been watching the forums. They want their machines (and i don’t blame them) but do not have the breadth of vision that comes from reading/partaking in the threads/discussions.
As you say, they want their machines now and are sick of waiting.
Also to Internationals, who are generally used to more robust discussions about things the 'i’m sorry… " speech doesn’t work, many of us see it as shallow.
On the other hand, i GENUINELY feel for Dan and the Crew because it seems the production/delivery errors are WAY out of reasonable expectation, and possibly/probably also out of their hands.
Well there is no way that would be legal or even a sane thing to do. But your point is nonetheless clear… as things stand i do not believe Glowforge can take the risk to ship internationally until their unit success rate reaches levels they can be confident in.
Would i be cheesed… you bet
Would i be even more cheesed if my unit arrived and it was a full- or semi-brick - you bet x10
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Makes one wonder why they don’t offer a crated version of shipping for international. I know if would cost more but there may be some who would be willing to add to the shipping cost to get a crate and quicker shipping. Just a thought
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Yeah in no way trying to belittle what is clearly real anxiety over the international situation. Just didn’t know how to get across the impact of delivering damaged machines any better.
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A crate would not help much because they are not being damaged by things destrying the box, they are damaged by shock. A crate won’t absorb much shock. You would be better with a bigger box and more foam but that will increase the already eye watering shipping cost.
They can’t ship international until they get the NRTL approvals and they don’t have those today.
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HI Palmercr,
The crate has to be over sized like this:
https://www.uline.com/Product/Detail/S-18248/Wood-Crates/Wood-Crate-48-x-30-x-30
Its 126 USD in volume support the glow forge in the middle and surround with packing peanuts its on a pallet so no “handling” less damage. Certifications are a completely different story. Personally I would ship the unit with out the head and then ship the head separately. The unit would then be a CNC and the head would be the laser. If the customer completes “assembly” then what certification. 
oh yeah this is something you will have to do when the laser goes and you need a new one anyway.
You mean remove the laser tube, rather than the head, don’t you?
Canada, at least, would still classify the head removal as a laser-based material removal tool.
You’d have to remove the ‘engine’ of the machine (ie the laser tube).
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oops yeah that’s why I said you would have to do it eventually anyway.
-D
Day 0 and no flood of emails. In fact the opposite. The last mention of receiving an email was a week ago. I have my own graph of emails received that includes any mention in the forum as well and those on the spreadsheet. This is the first time it has flat lined. Even during the pause for new packaging there were a few emails.
Dan says there are no delays but I see nothing that points to the campaign orders all being shipped in the next six weeks.
NY Makerfaire is next week. Perhaps if you had some good news you’d sit on it until the show or shortly before. If you had several good announcements, you’d stack them up so that there would be something to announce every day for several days.
And if there is any bad news in the offing, perhaps it should wait until the day after Makerfaire. But maybe this time, only good news. For example, good news, we’re now shipping day 2 pros and we’re still on track to ship all pre-orders by October. (Where shipping = initiate the shipping process by asking the recipient to accept current feature list and provide their address. Yes, yes, some were hoping delivered into hands by October, but that was never official.)
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Very annoying that news is held back existing customers to make a splash at a NYMF but that is what happened at BAMF although it turned out to be a lie.
Yes that is what I expect.
Dan has said several times that the aim is have them at least dispatched by the end of October, not just the emails. If they fall back to the weasel definition of shipping that puts the end of all pre-orders into the middle of Jan. It still requires a dispatch rate far in excess of anything we have seen so far but is more believable. To send all the rest of the 30 day emails in the next six weeks just doesn’t seem credible as that is the bulk.
My experience in shipping…I received my email for shipment on August 31st.
Excluding the air filter, there are 3 boxes to ship:
Glowforge
Accessories (crumb tray, exhaust hose, etc)
Proofgrade Materials
I received my proofgrade materials on the 11th
Its half way (3 weeks) from the 6 week period, so I am hoping of course it will be sooner rather than later.